This invention relates generally to CATV systems and is particularly directed to a system for assigning preferred channel numbers to standard CATV channels to facilitate channel assignment into predetermined groups for improved authorized channel number selection.
Increases in the number and variety of programs available to CATV viewers has been dramatic and promises to continue at a steady rate of growth. Indeed, cable compatible television receivers are available which provide the capability to tune to well in excess of 100 CATV channels. CATV channel selection has, as a result, become more complicated for the viewer with the vastly increased number of available CATV channels.
Further complicating channel selection for the CATV viewer is the grouping of channels into tiers where the viewer subscribes to the viewing of selected tiers of channels as desired. This tiered organization of CATV channels is generally based upon program content and the viewer may typically subscribe to one or more groups. Since the CATV channels are generally organized, or grouped, on the basis of program content, channels within a particular group may possess widely varying channel numbers. The viewer is thus required to either memorize a series of unrelated and widely disparate numbers or to refer to a look-up table during channel selection. This, of course, is an inconvenience for the CATV viewer and will become increasingly so as the number of available CATV channels increases.
In addition, the number of available CATV channels has increased to the point where frequently, for signal handling purposes, more than one cable is required for handling all of the channels. Thus, the viewer must not only remember the number of a desired CATV channel, but must also remember on which cable that channel is being received for cable switching purposes during the channel selection process. The situation becomes even more complicated when the channels are organized in a tiered arrangement and channels included within a particular group are received on more than one cable. The viewer then must not only remember widely disparate and logically unrelated channel numbers, but also must remember which of several cables must be switched to for reception of a desired CATV channel.
The present invention simplifies the complicated process of CATV channel selection by providing a system and method for arranging CATV channels in groups in which the channel numbers may be assigned in a logical sequence to facilitate viewer channel number selection where the carrier frequencies of the channels within that group may be widely separated. The present invention further facilitates CATV program tiering and selective viewer authorization for predetermined CATV channels. In addition, the present invention provides for automatic cable switching upon channel number selection to accommodate a multi-cable system.